Happy Tails Books was inspired by a Boston Terrier named Bill. Bill was rescued from a Missouri puppy mill and has had a long road to recovery. These days he is enjoying life as a dog and always has something silly going on. This blog chronicles his recovery and comedy as well as life as a dog foster parent.

Thursday, April 30, 2009

I would call it a "hoot"...

...but it was more of a "woof!"

Bill and I went down to Denver to pick up our new furry foster friend Snowy yesterday. All I knew was that he was coming into town with a group called "CARE," Colorado Animal Rescue Express. This group is neat - they're a non-profit that transports dogs between shelters, rescue groups and forever families.

When I spoke with Linda, one of the founders, she said something about 53 dogs but I blew it off because I thought I had misheard her. It turns out that I heard her right! These dogs rolled into the Walmart parking lot where we were to meet them like a bunch of rock stars! Eager crowds awaited their arrival with the excitement of children on the first day of school.

When the vans pulled in and the unloading process began I couldn't believe how organized it was. 53 dogs, 53 paperwork packets, 5 volunteers (I think) and lots of people waiting. Once the doors opened the scene definitely got a bit chaotic, but it was organized chaos. There were dogs and people all over the place but as stressed as these brave dogs were everyone seemed to play nice. I highly recommend going down there just to view it sometime - it's amazing!

On to Snowy...

The dog I was picking up was in the second van. This was lucky because there was a dog with a definite case of kennel cough in the first one. Snowy was clearly stressed as he was kind of hyperventilating and when I finally took him into my possession he wouldn't pee. He was zig-zagging all over the place and pulling like an ox. I figured I would stick him in the car and drive him to somewhere mellower.

Well, we didn't get past the first exit on I-70 before I started smelling poo. I turn around and Bill is dancing across the seat trying to avoid stepping in it. At this point I'm going 70 mph on the highway so there wasn't much I could do. I aimed for the next exit but before I could get there Snowy decided to finish what he started and peed all over the seat too! Aargh!

I'm thankful for the waterproof seat cover I bought a few months ago as this was much less of a disaster than it could have been. The fun didn't stop there though. As I was cleaning out the car on the side of the road, Bill decided to jump out. He was totally calm and collected but I was yelling like a maniac! In the end, I was very lucky that we practiced "sit" so many times because he sat for me and I was able to put him back in the car before anything tragic happened.

The rest of the ride home was pretty uneventful except for being stuck in construction traffic for a half hour. This is not normally too big a deal but I really wanted to get Snowy out of the car so he could chill out. Oh, and the car smelled like poo!